Perdido 03

Wednesday, February 25, 2015

Cuomo Gets Beaten Up Over Ethics, Hypocrisy

Cuomo has so far raked in more than $188,000 from HarperCollins, a News Corporation subsidiary. That is part of a book deal that could ultimately net him more than $700,000. With Albany’s transactional politics now the subject of a federalprobe, the context of that April 2013 book deal
is particularly significant: An International Business Times review of
New York state documents reveals that News Corporation gave Cuomo a book
contract after Cuomo’s administration backed a series of state
initiatives that benefited the media giant.

One of the initiatives was a bill that created a special
sales tax break for online-only publications that charge for
subscriptions. News Corporation, which was one of the two companies that
lobbied for the bill, was at the time investing tens of millions of
dollars in such a publication. Another initiative was a special tax
exemption that Cuomo’s administration created for electronic books,
which are sold by, among others, HarperCollins. State records list News
Corporation as lobbying Cuomo’s tax department in the months before the
exemption was announced. And, while News Corporation lobbied the
governor’s office in 2012, Cuomo championed an expansion of controversial film and television tax credits that have benefited News Corporation’s films, and that News Corporation had lobbied for in the past.

News Corporation did not respond to IBTimes’ request for
comment. Cuomo’s office -- his calls for transparency notwithstanding --
declined IBTimes’ request to release the text of the contract for the
book, which has reportedly
sold just 3,000 copies. The governor’s office also declined to comment
about the legislation he signed and the administrative tax change his
officials enacted. The governor has previously rejected the notion that
his book deal had anything to do with state business, saying
book income is “an exception” because “I'm not allowed to represent
anyone or any business matter." He has also scoffed at the idea of
applying outside income restrictions on statewide elected officials like
himself, challenging anyone to identify how those paying his book
contract benefited from his policies.

Q: Governor, why didn't your ethics plan close the LLC
loophole, which allows LLCs to be treated as individuals under the law?
[Cuomo has raised $1 million from Leonard Litwin, a landlord, under this provision. Lawmakers from both parties are also regular beneficiaries.]

CUOMO:
You know, there are a lot of things that you could include—this was
about ethics, this was about responding to a particular point in time
and focusing all our energy on making a difference on that issue. You
make it too broad, then, first of all, you almost defy success, right? …
I wanted to keep it sharp, tight, and frankly, indefensible that you
could be opposed to these five points. How can you be opposed to
disclosure? How can you be opposed to pension forfeiture? How can you be
opposed to a fair per diem policy? I believe these items are almost
inarguable, hence saying the budget should be conditioned on their
acceptance.If you inject an issue that
you know is combative, like LLCs, well, I don't know that you're then
arguing in good faith that this is an inarguable premise when you know
LLCs have been argued for years and years and years.

What is the argument you've heard for not doing it?

It's the same argument you've heard. Why hasn't it happened?

The only argument I've heard is it allows rich people to multiply their political giving.

That's their argument. And that's why it hasn't happened for years and years.

Bharara
says “stay tuned,” and the Capitol went for a loop when Silver was
arrested. Should New Yorkers be concerned about you or senior members of
your administration? Is there a legal risk that you feel regarding this
ongoing probe, and what can you tell us to address those concerns?

I
don't think there should be a concern. Has there been a series of
'scandals' in Albany? Yes. The shortness of memory surprises me. ... Paul Grondahl had a story
that starts with an opening quote of these scandals in Albany and it's
ongoing and every few months there's a scandal in Albany and every few
months somebody gets arrested and on and on and on and it sounds like it
was written contemporaneously. Then it says, 'So said Teddy Roosevelt.'The
scandals in government are not new. The question is, keep refining the
system so that you do everything you can to prevent it, and if it
happens then find it and punish it, and that is my point on the ethics
disclosure. Five points, very strong, and by the way focusing on the
issues arising from the case: pension forfeiture, outside income. … I
remember with my father, this was the constant drumbeat. You talk about
the speaker: This was the third speaker who has been indicted. This is
nothing new. I
remember Mel Miller. And if you look at the genesis of most of the
cases, it is because you have a part-time Legislature, and the part-time
legislator can also have an outside business. … Many of them are
lawyers, they can represent the private client, and you don't know who
the private client is. … The case that keeps moving over and over is
there was a conflict between a legislator who represented privately
versus the public interest. That was the Joe Bruno case. That is inherent conflict.[They say] 'Well, we want to have a part-time Legislature. We don't want to have a full-time Legislature.
That's the constitutional framework.' Fine. So disclose the private
clients. 'Well, that violates my right as a lawyer and my clients'
rights.' No, it doesn't. That is just a red herring argument.The [New York City] Bar Association has said,
unequivocally, you can release the client's name. 'Well, some clients
will be embarrassed. Criminal case, divorce case.' Fine: exempt them. … But
clients that pose a potential conflict when they may be retaining you
for your public capacity rather than your private capacity have to be
disclosed. … Why does tort reform never get passed by the Legislature?
There are little secrets that never sit right.

I understand that, but there is also concern about the executive branch.

There shouldn't be.

Could
you elaborate a little on that, and can you describe if there's been
any internal review that you've undertaken at the same time as the
federal probe? You were elected in 2010, and again in 2014, talking
about ethics, talking about changing the tenor of state government. I
hear lots of concerns from people that there's going to be some kind of
action that could involve the administration.

Yeah, I
hear a lot of things from a lot of people. You should be more
discriminating in who you're talking to, what you take to heart.We have said … we worked very hard to clean up the culture of Albany, and we have. There is no doubt that there is more disclosure today
than ever before—there is more disclosure in terms of clients, there is
more disclosure in terms of income than ever before, there is more disclosure about who's going before state agencies, who has an interest in legislation. We have proceeded in leaps and bounds.[They
say] 'Well, it's not enough.' That may be true, it's not enough. But
it's also true that we've made tremendous progress. That gets left out
of the story, and, by the way, I don't know that it's ever going to be
enough unless you make a structural change to who can represent outside
clients, et cetera. ... Do
I feel we've done what we said we would do? Yes. Also, we've proposed a
lot of ethics legislation that the Legislature has refused to pass.
Right? It's a very difficult situation because the body that would be
regulated is the body that needs to approve the regulations. … What
do you do? You say, I'm going to give you a very tight, narrow package
and say, 'If you don't accomplish this, I'm not going to sign the
budget.' You cannot say or do any more than I did.

Why don't your proposals capture the executive branch? Yourself?

Structurally,
you don't have the conflicts with the executive because you don't have
the opportunity for conflict. None of the people around the state,
statewides, have outside income from clients. An elected official can do
it.

Well, New Jersey bans all kind of speaking fees, book fees, all outside income. Other governors have taken speaking fees.

If there was a governor who you thought was abusive, then that would be fine.

But
governor, the question isn't whether or not it's abusive, it goes to
whether there's a potential conflict. You have not yet released the full
details of your book deal with HarperCollins, which keeps everyone
guessing as to just how much income you're going to derive from it.

On a year-to-year basis as required by law. But you haven't taken the extra step.

Hang around. Next year you'll see the other payment.

But does that go to the level of transparency that you're trying to create?

It's
News Corp. You know that company. You know who owns it, and it is a
book deal. You come up with some theory of how there's a conflict,
writing a book, and we'll talk about it at that point. I understand the
potential conflicts with speaker fees. I was here when we went through
that—who engaged you, was there a conflict … I have not done speaking
fees.

News Corp., on issues that you ended up either signing or putting the budget. Tax breaks for online publications.

Tax
breaks for online publications. I have no idea that they lobbied for
it. I don't even know what it is, by the way. Also: The ethics laws that
we proposed do apply to the executive, right … but the executive does
not have many of the liberties that the Legislature does.

Gov. Andrew Cuomo said he hasn’t had any conversations with federal
prosecutors investigating his office’s role in the activities and
disbandment of his Moreland Commission, but declined to say whether his
staff has.

“Not myself. You’d have to ask people individually,” Cuomo said when asked by reporters following a Capitol cabinet meeting.

When asked how he would not know if his staff has talked to the U.S.
Attorney’s Office or has been subpoenaed, he responded: “Not
necessarily. I wouldn’t know if you were. It’s nobody else’s business
besides the individual.”

He added, “You’d have to ask individuals. None to me.”

U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara has been investigating Cuomo’s decision
to end the panel’s work last March and whether there was any meddling by
Cuomo’s office into the Moreland Commission, which the governor vowed
was independent.

Cuomo's trying to dictate to the Legislature in his "Sheriff Andy" style over ethics reform but it's hard to take him seriously when he's jiving over reforms that would affect him (like the LLC loophole) and refuses full transparency over the News Corp deal.

With the pounding he took over various issues today, I think we can officially say that Andrew Cuomo's lost control of the narrative in Albany.